


Character study-Anne

by iwtv



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Anne's past, F/M, Gen, Meeting Jack, Third in character studies, liberation/freedom
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-31
Updated: 2015-12-31
Packaged: 2018-05-10 14:22:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5589451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iwtv/pseuds/iwtv
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Together they disappear. It was easy, too. Easy to shed her pretty clothes and pretty hat. Easy to dress like a man, to talk like a man. It was a part of her before she even knew it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Character study-Anne

She is quiet. Her mother used to tell her she was like a mouse. Mice girls never get a good man, her mother said. They were too timid. Men did not like timid girls. She did not like her mother. She stayed quiet but her head was roaring. She knew about the whispers in the next room, about the screams across the street. She knew about the money that exchanged hands not so discreetly.

She listens.

She gets married. The gentleman is of plain features and decent dress. He introduces himself to her with the eyes of a wolf and the smile of an alligator. Predator and prey. She remains quiet and accepts his hand. She knows this will mean more money and a future. She sees only a predator and knows that predators are always hungry.

She prays.

She listens to her own cries the first time he hits her. Men don’t like timid girls, he tells her. Something in her snaps at last. She shoves him away. Instinct. Survive. That is what she must do, isn’t it? He beats her until she can no longer stand. She watches from the bed as heavy charcoal clouds roll over the sky. Another rainy English day.

She despairs.

He looks at her from across the bar. Looks at her more than once. She dares not to look back. Her husband’s eyes are always watching. She has taken to dropping her head low. She tugs at the brightly-colored hat. He swears at her all the time for leaving it on. How improper and rude. Un-lady like. She stares down at the table. Listens as he drinks and roars and drinks so more. She wishes she could never hear him again. She wishes for silence. She wishes for peace.

She wishes.

When he did it, he did it quick. She had scarcely understood what he had done. A quick splash of blood and two more strokes and it was over. He was dead. She had panicked. Bent down like the good wife they thought her to be. Then he had lifted her up, the other one. The one looking at her. The blade was still in his hand, crimson coated. He took her out of the bar. She breathed in the air so deeply she could have wept. He had saved her. He knew her already.

She smiles.

Together they disappear. It was easy, too. Easy to shed her pretty clothes and pretty hat. Easy to dress like a man, to talk like a man. It was a part of her before she even knew it. Killing came easy too. There were plenty of men like her husband here in this New World. Men who would grow old and die insulting and beating their mistresses and girlfriends. Not if she had anything to say about it. She did. She let her sword speak for her. She lets her eyes speak for her.

She adapts.

Together they grow close. Close like she never was with her husband, like she had never been with anyone. She is attracted to him and him to her. It is always an easy comradery with Jack. She loves this, loves how like friends they are with one another, how they can insult and criticize one moment, and make love the next. There is a freedom here. She knows it because it is something she could never imagine before in a place she did not know existed.

She lives.


End file.
